Three years ago, Prince Sammons was known as Prince Michael and living in Nigeria with his family with no idea what football even was. That's a long way from his current home and being one of the more sought-after 2016 football recruits in the country.
Growing up he thought basketball would be his ticket to a better life, but a difficult journey, a new name and family and a bit of luck led him where he stands now, and plenty of opportunity lies ahead.
Coming to America
In September 2011, with the dream of playing basketball and getting a good education, Prince Michael was preparing to leave his home and family. He had been found by an American scout in Africa and had been told there was a high school hoops program in Maryland that had a spot waiting for him.
"Growing up I wanted to come to America to become someone in life," he said. "I wanted to take care of my siblings because there are so many problems [in Nigeria]."
The move would be difficult enough, as he would be leaving behind his nine siblings -- seven brothers, one sister and a cousin whom his father had taken in as his own -- and both parents, who lived a meager life in the Lagos region of Nigeria where his mother worked as a chicken trader and his father did anything he could to help his family survive.
Shortly before he was to depart for America, Prince's mother died. That loss delayed his move, but Prince still chose to continue with his journey.
Unbeknownst to those involved, the delay resulted in the forfeit of his spot on the Maryland high school basketball team for which he had dreamed of playing.
Prince reconnected with the basketball scout who had set everything up, and because Prince had nowhere else to go, he lived with the scout in Wisconsin from September 2011 to January 2012.
Only months after he lost his mother, the already embattled teen found out that his father had passed away.
Sitting some 6,000 miles away, lonely and with no proper way to grieve the loss of his parents, Prince was left alone with his seemingly forlorn goal of a better life as an athlete in America.
There weren't many prospects or opportunities for a teenage Nigerian immigrant, but finally he found a school and potentially a basketball program that would accept him.
He was set to enroll at Cincinnati Hills Christian Academy, but still had no home. With so much going wrong for on this journey, his luck was about to turn.
The water boy
A few of the basketball coaches at Cincinnati Hills got word that a tall, lanky African student was about to transfer in. The story of his family tragedy also spread and freshman basketball coach Brandon Sammons and his wife, Betsy, felt an obligation to help.
They decided to take Prince into their home and legally adopted him. Prince Micheal was now Prince Sammons and he had a home.
"Jan. 2 is when I found out about his situation, Jan. 4 I talked to the basketball scout, and then that Saturday I got a text saying Prince was going to be dropped off at 1:55 p.m. and I needed to go pick him up," Brandon Sammons said. "We knew nothing about him other than he had lost his parents, he hadn't been in school for the past few months, that he liked to play basketball, and that he was tall. It was one of those moments that we felt God was calling us to do something and we felt obedience was called for."
Sammons, then 15 years old, was sent on a megabus from Wisconsin to Cincinnati and waited on a street corner for the Sammons family to pick him up.
After some difficulty with paperwork and the enrollment process, Sammons was finally attending an American school.
The basketball coaches were clamoring to get him on the court, but once the football coaches saw the 6-foot-7 prospect, they too wanted him to suit up for them in the fall.
The only problem was that Sammons had no idea what football was or how the game was played. In fact, when he was first told to try football he thought the coach was asking him to play soccer, which he already played.
He was hesitant to participate at first and because of problems with his visa, he wasn't permitted to play his freshman season anyway.
After persistent efforts by Christian Hills football coach Eric Taylor, Sammons agreed to try the sport and would be the team's water boy for his first year.
"When [Michigan linebacker coach] Mark Smith first saw him, Prince was walking down the hallway as a student and Coach Smith asked who that was," Taylor said. "I said, that's my water boy and he started laughing. The kid is a monster. He works hard. He just knew nothing about the sport."
More and more college coaches started hearing about Christian Hills' water boy and the school started gaining attention.
After his season observing as the water boy, Sammons, all 6-7 and 260 pounds of him, hit the field without a clue of what he was supposed to do physically.
A coach looked at his hands and saw how massive they were. He asked Sammons if he could catch and threw a ball at him. Sammons plucked the ball with one hand so the staff decided he should start out as a receiver.
Sammons laughs when he says that didn't work out too well for him. He wasn't improving so the coaches decided to move him to defensive end and put his hand in the dirt.
That proved to be a wise decision. Sammons is now ranked as the No. 47 prospect in the 2016 class and holds offers from Alabama, Auburn, Ohio State, Penn State and more.
Who is Nick Saban?
Sammons' sophomore season started shakily, but by the fourth game Cincinnati extended a verbal offer of a scholarship.
Things took off from there and he started to grasp his position. Because interest from colleges was picking up as well, he had to start learning about the recruiting process.
Brandon Sammons took his adopted son on visits to schools, including Alabama, Auburn, Georgia, Michigan and Ohio State. The visits went well, but because Prince Sammons knew so little about football, neither what he was going through nor the stature of the people he was meeting hit home.
"He's about as naïve as it comes for a kid that everyone calls a high-profile recruit; he has no clue. We had a chance to go down South and meet Coach Saban, [Gus] Malzahn and [Mark] Richt, and Prince couldn't have picked any of the three out of a lineup," Brandon Sammons said. "You say to him, hey, Coach Saban wants to talk to you and he's like, 'I have no clue who Coach Saban is.' That's part of what I like about it, though; he doesn't have any preconceived notions about it."
It's all still fresh in his mind, and Prince Sammons knows he still has a lot to learn both on the field and off. Sammons is a model student and focused on his education while adjusting to the world of big-time football recruiting. This wasn't how his plan was supposed to go -- he tried basketball, too, his sophomore season, but it was clear to him and his coaches that football should be his focus -- but he sees a means to an end and is going after it as if it's his only shot.
"To me, I have to give God the praise and I'm not going to sit here and cross my legs and fold my hands. I'm still new to the game and I'm going to keep working hard to make it to the NFL and get my degree," he said. "If I do that, I can go back home and help my siblings and everyone that needs help."
Today, he lives in Cincinnati, but two years from now Sammons will once again live in an unfamiliar place and hope that it's one step closer to that dream for which he has endured so much and traveled so far.